


(i said man) stay here awhile

by Anonymous



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Love, Praise, Praise Kink but not in a sexual way, Protective Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-21
Updated: 2016-12-21
Packaged: 2018-09-10 19:54:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8936626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: from the FB Kink Meme: "Percival Graves, an orphan, last of his line, Head Auror and Director of Magical Security, finds himself with a pair of sisters who will go to bat for him. Said sisters, in turn, are greatly enjoying having an older brother of their very own - one who is just as protective of them in turn."





	

**Author's Note:**

> no beta. title from "...all the go inbetweens" by silversun pickups which inspired a lot of this

He has to keep his steps light and in tune to Tina’s heavy footfalls. On their way into the boardinghouse, she had muttered something about a “Mrs. Esposito” not allowing men in the boardinghouse and shushed him when he tried to ask about it.

“Teenie?” Queenie had called, sticking her head around a corner. “What are you doin’ with Mister Graves?”

Graves had seen Queenie around the MACUSA offices before. He knew she was smarter than others’ thought she was. It was easy to look at her giggles and tendency to hex toilets as immature but he knew she got bored very easily and needed to be going, going, going at all times.

She was a lot like Tina in that aspect. Neither sister enjoyed idleness. Even in the quiet of their rooms, Queenie still had no more than 4 charmed objects going— soup stirring itself, an iron going over a pair of Tina’s slacks, a sewing machine clacking away at two pieces of blushing silk, and finally a pair of socks wringing themselves out over the small bathtub. Even Tina was charming hers and Graves’ coats to hang on the rack as she summoned three bowls out of the cupboard with a crook of her finger. 

The Goldstein sisters were not Graves’ first choice of a safe house after the pulled him out of the charmed pocket watch Grindelwald had trapped him in. But Grindelwald had been inside every corner of his mind so the shanty in Maine, the bodega in Florida, and even the cabin in the woods of Idaho were all out of the question. Seraphina knew where Tina and Queenie lived, knew that Mrs. Esposito wanted a full name, address, and complete history on anyone who stepped through the front door.

 

(Seraphina had gone to summon Tina directly for a job and the old woman had wound an bony finger into Seraphina’s blonde curls and asked her about her grandparents and told her a droll story about her son who died in the war)

 

So when Seraphina clasped her bejeweled hands in front of her glittering robes and cast her dark eye at Graves, he knew he would had no say in the matter of his temporary relocation. Instead he was given a charmed bag of his possessions and ushered out behind Tina.

“I don’t want to be a burden,” he had said quietly to Tina as they walked out of the building. Tina had rolled her eyes and waved her hand.

“Queenie’s already used the Undetectable Charm to conjure you up a bedroom,” she had explained, smiling. “And it’s only for a few days!”

 

Those few days turned into a few weeks. Graves found he actually _enjoyed_ the presences of the two sisters. His own parents had been proud and stoic, rough handshakes and dry kisses to the forehead expressing their own pride in their son’s top marks and sporting achievements. He wasn’t used to just how… _loud_ Tina and Queenie could be. They weren’t obtrusive or obnoxious. But when Queenie would tell Tina about what she saw in Tom down in Wand Registry’s head at lunch, Tina would allow herself to laugh with a wide mouth, a crack thundering through the small apartment. Queenie liked to play syrupy jazz as she worked on dresses and slacks, humming along with an open mouth. Graves’ found he didn’t even mind Tina mumbling to herself as she got dressed in the morning, reciting morning meeting minutes to herself as she grabbed at shoes in the bright morning sun. 

 

What did bother Graves was the things Queenie would tell him and Tina over dinner.

 

(these dinners, by the way, would be the end of Graves— he was used to telling house-elves to bring him whatever was cheapest and quickest and now Queenie was spoiling him with pie every night! he had mentioned he missed the pasta his mother had their house-elf prepare on Christmas when he was a lad and and Tina and Queenie managed to recreate it down to the cheese bake after he had a night full of terrors in his dreams)

 

(he did not cry. Graves men do not cry.)

 

He knew Queenie was a Legilimens— he suspected it was how she was able to recreate the dish— but he had never thought of himself as unrestrained. Growing up in the Graves family meant decorum and poise, a poker face perfected at the age of 11 years old. But Queenie is comically smacking at Tina’s hand at their rickety dinner table. 

“No!” Tina had gasped, voice low and unrestrained. “He did not!”

“He did!” Queenie had managed between full-belly laughs. “Plain as day, I could see it! Oh, Teenie, you shoulda seen it! You had on the robes that old Headmistress McMann used to wear! Remember, she had that awful wimple! And you had this leather crop in your hands and you kept saying ‘you’ve been a naughty boy, Thomas! you’ve been a naughty boy, Thomas!’ and he kept going _all day_!”

“Thomas?!” Tina was red to her ears. “He’s so quiet! And shy!”

Graves tuned out the rest of the conversation, too busy planning on how to demote Thomas when they allowed him back at work. 

 

It’s not that Tina and Queenie weren’t attractive. He greatly admired Tina’s work ethic and passion— she was the kind of woman that his mother would have pushed on him as a wife were she still alive. Plain-faced and hard-working just like a good Graves woman should be. But Queenie was bright and sunny, pinks and golds and giggles and smiles. A clever young woman with a hint of mischief and defiance in her eye— the kind of woman Graves would have chased were he a young man again. 

He just found himself becoming awfully _fond_ of the two sisters. He loved them both in their own ways. He loved Tina after she had threatened to hex him back into bed after he tried to flee their apartment after a nightmare. Her face was oily with sleep, her hair a nest, and her pajamas were rumpled as she pushed him back into his room.

“Percival!” she had shouted. He was shocked at the use of his first name but she was flushed pink with worry. “You are not leaving this house! I don’t care what your gut tells you! There is nothing but trouble for you if you are seen by any of those…those….those _assholes_ who want to kill you! Do I need to remind you that you spent the better part of the year hiding inside of a goddamn pocket watch?”

He gulped loudly and backed into his bedroom, He had never experienced situations like this. His own mother would threaten him with curses and corporal punishment if he misbehaved. He had never be threatened with his own bed. His father had beaten him once with his cane after he had broken an antique blown glass flower.

“Now you get back into bed!” she scolded, looking at him as if he were a naughty child. “And…and I’ll tell Queenie that you can’t have any strudel for breakfast! Do you understand?”

“Yes, Tina.” 

He resisted the urge to stick his tongue out as she closed the door.

 

Queenie withheld the breakfast strudel. Graves pouted.

 

Queenie treated him like a child when the mood struck her. Graves would never admit he enjoyed it. She would tuck a linen napkin into his collar with a flourish and tell him not to eat the potatoes yet because they were hot. She would kiss his cheeks with wet, overdramatic kisses, a drawn out “mwah!” when she pulled away. 

One night, he had fallen asleep with his head in her silken lap and she had played with his hair and hummed to him. They never spoke of it again but the warmth of the evening radiated through him for days afterwards. There was so much _love_ in her delicate fingers. He never remembered his mother holding him like this. One time, a house-elf held his hand as he cried over the death of the family dog but his father had shooed her away and told him to dry his tears. 

He suspected Queenie saw that memory because she made an effort to take his hand in hers whenever he felt emotional. He thinks she sees plenty of his memories because she picks up on things, and later Tina does as well. He remember his mother drank lemonade with crushed ice and he thought she was so classy for it. Tina offers him a glass a few days later and in the sunshine of the cooling glass, he sees his mother again. He sees her grey curls and stern pearls and for a moment, he is a young boy in his father’s study with a glass of lemonade. 

 

He gets fidgety one warm July night when Queenie doesn’t come home with Tina. Tina mentions something about a date with a No-Maj she met when Newt was in town and Graves feels his face hot with jealously. Queenie didn’t think to mention she had a _date_?

“Tell me about him,” he spits to Tina.

An hour later, he decides Jacob is…tolerable. A friendly No-Maj with a smile and a cup of hot cocoa for anyone who needs it. He owns a bakery of off 15th street and Queenie brings him a heavily frosted cupcake when she sneaks home in the wee hours of the morning. 

“Oh, Percy,” she gushes. “You should meet him. He’s so perfect. Sweetest man this side of the river!”

He hates to admit that the cupcake is delicious. 

 

He finally meets Jacob when he begs Tina to get him out of the apartment. She decides they can go get some treats and concludes that it can’t be too dangerous to walk down to the bakery and back.

“Queenie’s told m’ so much about ya!” Jacob says warmly, smacking Graves’ hand in a handshake too friendly for Graves’ liking. “Hope ya like croissants. I got a big batch of ‘em in the ovens now.” He goes back into the kitchen before turning around and pointing at Graves. “Hey buddy, you want some hot cocoa? It’s my Nan’s recipe and it’s delicious! I’ll make ya a cup.”

 

The hot cocoa is fucking delicious. Graves decides Jacob can stay around.

 

It’s the Sunday before he’s supposed to be reinstated and he can’t sleep. Tina shuffles into the kitchen to fetch a glass of milk and finds him staring at the floor.

“Mr. Graves?”

“Tina.” It’s all he can muster. He can feel his voice cracking in his throat. If he says another word, he’s going to sob. She sits next to him and takes his clammy palm in her hand. They’re cold from handling the milk jug but she folds both of them over his hand, squeezing gently. 

“Are you— do you— how—?” She can’t formulate the question properly, her own overwhelming sense of decorum stopping her from prying. 

And something breaks deep inside of him. He sobs, heaving ugly noises that hurt his chest. He wrenches his hand from Tina’s grasp and digs the heels of his hands into his eyes as he slides onto the floor.

“Percival!” she gasps, sitting down next to him and flinging her arms around his shoulders. He lets himself sob into her neck, mumbling about his failures and his shortcomings. He starts off with crying about Grindelwald and soon finds himself apologizing for shattering the glass flower.

“It—“ she freezes against him, hands awkward as they rub his back. “It- it’s okay, Percival. It’s okay.” She presses a kiss to his temple, lips brushing his skin. “I’m very proud of you.”

He doesn’t hear Queenie but feels her arms wrap around him from behind, effectively trapping him between Queenie and Tina. Tina gently rocks him as Queenie hums in his ear. Here, on the floor of their shared apartment, Percival Graves feels love. 


End file.
